The Grenada gazette. (Grenada, Miss.) 1885-18??, 1887-02-05
THAT SWING SHELF.
A Story About Mrs. Fothergin's
Treacherous One.

"YM don mean TO say L never tolC
YOU about Mrs. Fothergill's swing
shelfT
Aunt Hannah looked over her specta.
cles at us girls, and paused a moment
in the ~tocing-off of her stocking. We
were gathered in her cool, old. fashioned
.iuing-room, the cosiest spot in the old
house. to which the three of us annually
came for adclightful week in vacation.
The smell Of withered rose-leaves and
dried lavender will always. I am sure,
be associated in our minds with the
sweet. gentle-faced old lady, so hearty
in cordial hospitality, so untiring in her
efforts to make things pleasant for us,
yet with a way of flinging in an occa-
aonal word of quiet but cutting criti-
cism or suggestion which betokened a
keen but kindly perception Of faults
and follies.
you never have, Aunt Hannah. If
there is q good story it is a sin and
a shame you have not told it before.
Go on, please
"Ill wait till you bring your work,
young ladies'" said the old lady. with a
little twinkle in her eyes. I'm my
days young folks were not used to sit
with their hands folded on weekdays"
With signs of resignation we brought
our f%ancy-work, audibly declaring that
Amt Hannah's anxiety to inculcate in
us habits Of industry arose from the
fact that we always left behind us,
when we went away, the bits Of faucy-
work with which WI were engaged.
'Now, | must set up another stock
ing. you see," she said, first pulling
into shape and then rolling up the one
which had just dropped from her
needles. Patience, my dears."
After a little period of brisk count
ing she began:
Mrs. Fothergill, years and years
ago, was our parsons wife, and such a
parsons wife,
do you mean such a parson or such
a wife, auntyp' asked Kitty.
Don't BIO saucy; miss. l mean such
q wife. No reflection IN Mr., bother
gill at all; but he was just a good aver
age parssn-preached his sermons, and
visited his sick and buried his dead, in
a good. comfortable, ordinary way.
But there wasn't any average about
Mrs. Fothergill."
when they first took the charge we
didn't quite know what to make of her.
When we sent her a note telling her we
had made her president of the Dorcas
Society and the Home Missionary
Society and the Church Repairing
Fund. and would give her the lead in
the ladies' weekly meeting, and lay
a district for visiting and tract dis
tributing for her, she wrote back that
she would DO very glad to meet with us
when she had time, but that her large
family kept her pretty closely at home,
must say that it took our breaths
away u little at first, for Mrs. Marston,
Dur former pastors wife, had always
been at some kind Of q meeting every
day in tho week, for all she had a
larger family than Mrs. Fothergill, till
he went into a decline and died.
"Well-what was I going to doP
IN, the swing shelf. It began with the
a stranger came to the village and
put up at the tavern, and was taken
Town with in]ammatory rheumatism.
lad a suffering time, so it was said,
md couldn't get any quiet o any
ort OF good nursing. That wasn't the
lind Of call, you may be sure, that
anne to Mrs. Fothergill, and got for
that her large family gave her
'nough to do. Before anybody else had
'aA time to more than roll up their
yes at hearing tell Of his s~utferings,
shake their heads at his being
egleeted, Mrs. Fothergill and the par
on had quietly had a spring wagon {
Aled with feather-beds and blankets,